Sickness
by MidenianScholar
Summary: The Sound and the Fury: Caddy's perspective after her father's funeral, written in a parody of Faulkner's voice. "We both knew it when I got married his face was so dark even through the white gauze and his eyes were like mine dead."


_A/N: I chose to write this parody based on pages 202-205 of Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury. This scene is one of a few where I sympathized strongly with the character Caddy, and where I understood what she was thinking. When I was thinking about Caddy and the voice I would give her, I wanted to preserve Faulkner's version of a girl too beautiful to speak. I thought the best way to keep her beautiful would be to adopt the style Faulkner used in Quentin's chapter. However, I think that Caddy understood people better than Quentin did. I wanted to bring some of the self-awareness and understanding into this piece._

_I relied heavily on Faulkner's guide to the Compson family when I wrote this. I felt that the guide lent more insight to Caddy as a real person, instead of the idealized Quentin's Caddy, the maternal Benjy's Caddy or the disgraced Jason's Caddy. I wanted to emphasize that Caddy accepted her lot "without either seeking or fleeing it." Though she understands and loves others, and though she understands herself, there is a sort of regal aloofness about her. In the end, she submits, and doesn't really care. _

**Sickness**

The rain dripped, dripped on my head on the graves and I was silent. _You're sick_, he had said, Quentin had said. _You're sick you're sick_. Not as sick as you not sick enough to drown myself.

Quentin. There was a little girl and I had never really seen her not since she was born but she had his name. The veil was getting wet, clinging against my cheeks, and it was dark. Water rushed over him buried him hid him. There was that time when he held the knife to my throat and asked me to help, and even if he didn't know it I did help I did put that final pressure on him or maybe Herbert did or maybe Quentin the baby did. I took his beloved honor, his obsession his mate and I destroyed it and he died. _You're sick you can't _now he can be at peace _marry him _now he can be happy.

He had been dead long before they found the body long before he even saw the river. We both knew it when I got married his face was so dark even through the white gauze and his eyes were like mine dead.

I wished I could join him, in the real death where there would be silence or hell or whatever there was.

A fleeting glimmer of sun reflected off the shining wet grave. Had they brought Benjy to the funeral? Probably not they wouldn't have wanted to make a scene to bring him in public. Poor Benjy _he pawed and pawed at my dress_ poor Benjy who had never _bellowing in my ears _really understood _crying until my heart broke_ I wondered if he still missed me _I can't wash it off anymore it's not perfume _his whimsical distant eyes _it's me now _staring out through the mirror _it's me _looking at me _it's me_.

I wished I was like Benjy, existing alone existing outside of it all pure because I didn't understand what impurity was.

But really I don't.

The dull beating of my heart the rush of blood in my ears. I died a long time ago long before Quentin but unlike him I don't really mind being dead and alive at once.

I feel nothing really I want to feel but I feel nothing I want to feel nothing.

There were steps behind me, and I recognized the clip pattern of steps on the path. He was always hurrying but he never caught anything that didn't want to get caught. I turned just as he stepped across the wet grass, his cross expression turning even angrier when I lifted my veil.

"Hello, Jason," I said, extending my hand to him. He clenched his jaw when he took my hand, but I could see the calculating look in his eyes, the look that hungers for a profit.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, his voice low and angry. "I thought you promised her you wouldn't come back here. I thought you had more sense than that."

"Yes?" I asked, quietly gently not believing not caring. I turned to the graves and the flowers. Quentin's was covered in them, the ones I had bought for him. They smelled sweet and damp in the rain and it clogged my throat a little. I wondered if this was the same way he felt when he complained of honeysuckle when he said he hated honeysuckle. Father's grave, near Quentin's, had very little to cover it. Jason had never loved anyone so much as he loved saving as he loved profiting as he loved power. He had never understood Quentin or Father or me. "You did?" I asked quietly gently knowing that he didn't.

"I'm not surprised though," he said. "I wouldn't put anything past you. You don't mind anybody. You don't give a dam about anybody."

"Oh," I said, "that job." I stared down at the grave. _You're sick you're sick._ Jason shouldn't have stayed in this small place. He had been meant to go into the world not because he would become a great man but because it would protect the people he left behind. I could feel his hatred, steaming off him like the mist in the rain and the humidity of this southern graveyard. "I'm sorry about that, Jason."

"I bet you are," he said. "You'll talk mighty meek now. But you needn't have come back. There's not anything left. Ask Uncle Maury, if you don't believe me."

He thought I wanted money as if all I cared about was money as if I didn't care about the two men at my feet. "I don't want anything," I told him, still staring down at the graves. "Why didn't they let me know?" I whispered. "I just happened to see it in the paper. On the back page. Just happened to."

He doesn't answer for a while and I heard that dull beating in my head the thumping of my heart. It was odd, a dead sound.

"A fine lot you care," Jason says, and his voice has gone high-pitched in his anger, "sneaking in here as soon as he's dead. But it won't do you want good. Don't think that you can take advantage of this to come sneaking back. If you can't stay on the horse you've got, you'll have to walk back. We don't even know your name at that house," he said, staring at me while I stared at the grave. "Do you know that?" he said, his eyes digging for a response, for a wince or a whimper. "We don't even know your name. You'd be better off if you were down there with him and Quentin. Do you know that?"

"I know it," I said, but without pain or pity or anything. The words fell out dully limply and I didn't really care. I was already dead he just didn't know it couldn't see it. The only moment I felt my heart beat the only moment I rejoiced in its beating its song was when I saw her my daughter my baby. "Jason," I said, still staring down at the two markers, "if you'll fix it so I can see her a minute I'll give you fifty dollars."

"You haven't got fifty dollars," he said, almost sulking.

"Will you?" I asked, staring down down.

"Let's see it," he said. "I don't believe you've got fifty dollars."

I searched under my cloak, keeping my eyes still on the graves, thinking maybe if I saw her maybe if I could see my child just once just once more maybe my heart would sound alive again maybe it'd stop thudding dully against my chest. I held my hand out, the money visible to him, but I didn't look at him. It felt disgraceful to bargain for the sight of my child over the dead bodies of my brother and father.

"Does he still give you money?" he asked. His voice was calculating, counting up everything he could get out of me. "How much does he send you?"

_Stop it stop it just take the money. I'm sick I'm sick. _"I'll give you a hundred. Will you?"

"Just a minute," he said. "And just like I say. I wouldn't have her know it for a thousand dollars."

"Yes," I whispered. "Just like you say do it. Just so I see her a minute. I won't beg or do anything. I'll go on right away."

"Give me the money," he demanded, his hand reaching for it already.

"I'll give it to you afterwards," I said, louder, moving back from him. I let my veil fall over my face again, wanting a wall between us wanting extra strength.

"Don't you trust me?" he demanded again.

"No," I said. "I know you. I grew up with you." I used to be the strong one in the family the one they look to the one that kept them together. We were children and Jason kept whining but I put my foot down, I was in charge, Father said I was in charge. But then there were lovers and lovers and now I had no strength no will only a shadow of it only a shadow myself.

"You're a fine one to talk about trusting people," he said. "Well, I got to get on out of the rain. Goodbye."

_You're sick_ my pulse was dead in my ears _you're sick_ I had to see Quentin just once more. If I submitted if I showed him that I would obey he would do it. He just wanted power over me well he had it he damn well had it I just want to see my baby. "Jason."

He stopped just under the trees, his back to me. I knew he knew he had me but he sounded annoyed anyway. "Yes? Hurry up. I'm getting wet."

"All right," I said. "Here." I held out the money again and he came greedily. He tried to take it but I held on. "You'll do it?" I asked, looking at him from under the veil. His face was hard to see through the dark gauze. "You promise?"

"Let go," he hissed. "You want somebody to come along and see us?"

I let go, watching as he pocketed the money. Trust was all I had now and it felt empty it felt liked a lie. "You'll do it, Jason? I wouldn't ask you, if there was any other way."

"You dam right there's no other way." He looked back at me, and his eyes were disgusted. He was disgusted with this with me but I didn't really care. "Sure I'll do it. I said I would, didn't I? Only you'll have to do just like I say, now."

"Yes," I whispered. "I will."


End file.
